Scary McCain (temperamental warrior)

American Thinker ^ | 30 March 2008 | Judith Klinghoffer

[K-oneTexas]

Scary McCain

By Judith Klinghoffer

With McCain you get the real thing while with Obama you may get an audacity of rhetoric based on nothing but political expediency and imagined racial grievances. Recent polls reveal that the American people are beginning to get it and that scares not only McCain's Democrat opponents but also European leftists, especially following his successful stops in Britain and France.

These European McCain foes recognize the inherent weakness of the main ammunition their American counter parts have been using, his age. Late night comedians' tasteless jokes aside, in an era where 60 is the new 40 and 70 the new 50, too many Americans can look at the vitality of their own 72 year old parents, aunts and uncles or grandparents, as well as McCain's own performance on the campaign trail, and recognize the absurdity of the feebleness charge.

It is this context that we should read the Financial Times column written by Cambridge historian  and New American Foundation senior fellow, Anatol Lieven entitled: Why we should fear a McCain presidency? His intriguing answer which appears in bold print in the paper edition is:

Some of the worst 20th century catastrophes were caused by brave men with passionate sense of national mission.

Really? I was curious. Who could he mean? I could not think of an example. Apparently, neither could he. The closest he came to naming names is comparing McCain to Andrew Jackson, a highly regarded 19th century Democrat president and not a particularly scary one. He does tell us that so extreme is the McCain presidency going to be that it will make leftists look back with nostalgia at George W. Bush.  Indeed, European governments should start immediately planning on "how they could either prevent a McCain administration from pursuing pyromaniac policies or, if necessary, protect Europe from the ensuing conflagration." 

No, Lieven does not merely worry that McCain may bomb Iran (though he does worry about that) but that he will "not know how to deal cautiously and diplomatically with Russia and China." Well, Lieven seems desperate, indeed. You see, he argues that McCain shares "the American establishment's hatred of Russia" and, hence, may offer more support than Bush to Georgia's wish to restore its rule over Abkhazia and South Ossetia leading to a Georgian-Russian war. The notion of a severe deterioration of US relations with China is just thrown in for good measure.

But why should Americans believe that as experienced and knowledgeable a warrior as John McCain would behave so irresponsibly? Because he has an ungovernable temper, Lieven answers: 

"Mr McCain's policies would not be so worrying were it not for his notorious quickness to fury in the face of perceived insults to himself or his country. Even Thad Cochran, a fellow Republican senator, has said: ‘I certainly know no other president since I've been here who's had a temperament like that.'"

Well, let me enlighten him.  World War II hero and two term president Dwight Eisenhower was another military man with a lightening temper.  In her book First Mothers, Bonnie Angelo describes his mother's failure to teach him temper control. "From childhood those lightening flashes were as much a part of Ike as the contagious smile," she writes.

Biographer Carlo D'este describes  instances when "he totally lost his self-control -- whether beating an apple tree with his fists as a child, banging his head against a wall when playing poor tennis, or punching his fist through the wall of a cafe."  White House seamstress Lillian Rogers Parks tells how his wife Mamie lived in constant fear of his outbursts. Angelo reports that presidential aides became most familiar with a vein in his forehead which would noticeably stand out during press conference he found annoying as signaling, "Caution: high voltage temper."

White house advisor Merlo Pusey wrote:

Sometimes his anger is aroused and it may set off a geyser of hot words. The President's emotions are close to the surface and his irritations are registered on his face almost as readily as his general good humor.

That said, Eisenhower did help win World War II but did not start World War III. He, merely, ended the Korean War and presided over 8 years of relative peace and prosperity. Not a bad record for a brave honorable, if temperamental, warrior.  If temperamental McCain does as well we should all be very happy.

It is not McCain's age or temperament that truly scares Lieven but McCain's unapologetic pursuit of American national interest as well as his conviction that American national interest is irrevocably tied  to the interest of other democracies in Europe, Asia and the Middle East.  For Lieven, realism means appeasement and McCain, like another "old and scary" American president named Ronald Reagan, refuses to appease.  

Dr. Judith Apter Klinghoffer is the author of Vietnam, Jews and the Middle East: Unintended Consequences, the co-author of International Citizens' Tribunals: Mobilizing Public Opinion to Advance Human Rights and  a  History News Network  blogger.

[maine-iac7]

Geeze - don't have to go all the way back to Jackson or Ike - ask Dick Morris about Bubba - Bubba’s rages are well known. Take just the time he beat Morris to the floor and was pounding him while Hillary was pulling and screaming to get him to stop - and of course, we know Hillary has no temper.

The writer cites McCain as getting hot under the collar when someone denigrates the country - well, good on him

[maine-iac7]

I’m an American, and I’m voting for McCain. I live in the real world, and have to make real choices, not sit at my computer and whine that there’s no “perfect” candidate.

I’m an American, and I’m voting for McCain. I live in the real world, and have to make real choices, not sit at my computer and whine that there’s no “perfect” candidate.

Bears repeating! You are a breath of fresh air - I was despairing

[ozzymandus]

You’re the one who’s babbling. There’s never a “perfect” candidate, it’s always a choice of the lesser of two evils. If you don’t see any difference between McCain and the two RATS, you shouldn’t be allowed to vote, anyway.

[ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas]

>>I’m an American, and I’m voting for McCain.<<

You should do what you think is right of course, and I respect your choice.

>>I live in the real world, and have to make real choices, not sit at my computer and whine that there’s no “perfect” candidate.<<

Here comes the preposterous strawman argument again, with the trollish “whine” put in. Nobody thinks there is a “perfect” candidate.

In 2000 I was in Sandy Bell’s tavern in Edinburgh, Scotland. GW Bush had just won the election. There were a bunch of university professors and students all saying the same thing about Bush. “He is stupid...he will push the button to start World War 3.” I was the only one to defend Bush. They all said the same thing, like a bunch of parrots.

And that’s what I see so many McCain supporters do. They all repeat the same mantra. Before you accuse anyone of criticizing McCain because he is “not 100% conservative,” make sure that is what the person believes the problem is.

I believe there are very serious problems with McCain. He is already breaking the promise he made to “secure the border first.”

[ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas]

See #44.

[ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas]

>>I’m an American, and I’m voting for McCain. I live in the real world, and have to make real choices, not sit at my computer and whine that there’s no “perfect” candidate.

Bears repeating! You are a breath of fresh air - I was despairing<< Not "fresh," actually very stale, the same old McCain mantra. It's quite obvious that there is no perfect candidate. What you don't understand, or are pretending nor to understand, is that nobody believes that there is such a candidate.

[maine-iac7]

Don't assume to understand me - omnipotent one -
McC was not my first choice, not my second choice —— but he's is now the candidate -

don't like it

go suck your thumb -

I'm taking a hiatus - Fr is getting to smell too much like DU country. I miss the old FR - where the intelligent minds outnumbered the whiny kids

[ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas]

(Fixed formatting and spelling) >>

I’m an American, and I’m voting for McCain. I live in the real world, and have to make real choices, not sit at my computer and whine that there’s no “perfect” candidate.

Bears repeating! You are a breath of fresh air - I was despairing<<

Not "fresh," actually very stale, the same old McCain mantra. It's quite obvious that there is no perfect candidate. What you don't understand, or are pretending not to understand, is that nobody believes that there is such a candidate.

[ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas]

>>I miss the old FR - where the intelligent minds outnumbered the whiny kids<<

You call yourself intelligent and call those who have real concerns with McCain “whiny kids.” But you and other McCain supporters (not all, but quite a few) are really the ones who are posting trollish insults like 5th graders.

You guys keep repeating the same old taunts:

“Grow up.”
“Whiners.”
“You are throwing a tantrum because McCain isn’t 100% conservative....”

That last one is like saying I won’t eat rotten food because it isn’t 100% germ free. Actually, nothing I eat is germ free, but I have to draw the line somewhere.

I would vote for McCain if he just acted like he would keep his promise to secure the border. Jim Robinson actually is more anti-McCain than I am, but do you have the courage to write insulting posts to him?

[Kozak]

Wait until you hear the speeches.

I won't need a sleeping pill that night....

[ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas]

>>Probably beginning with the Greeks, but lost in time, is the conviction that one should and must separate the passions from intellect/reason.<<

(I was thinking of Achilles in the Iliad.)

I agree. I remember once I was a little emotional when I was condemning abortion to a “pro-choice” friend. He said I was being “irrational.” Ironically, his attack on my passion was itself passionate.

It’s true that anger, for example, can go too far, but what are we without emotion? I would say machines. Without passion, reason is meaningless.

[AuntB]

>>I miss the old FR - where the intelligent minds outnumbered the whiny kids<<

The “old” free Republic, since what 2004?

Yada, Yada.... I’ve been seeing the same stupid line from the same republicans on here for years.
I didn’t say ‘conservatives’, I said republicans. If you haven’t noticed, the republican party is no longer conservative. I don’t know why they just won’t admit it and and stand up for the liberal ideology they and McCain are so proud of.

We don’t have a party, daddy. Most of us didn’t even get to vote before McCain was annointed. When we no longer have free elections, it’s pretty much over. And some posters here don’t mind one damn bit that your vote doesn’t count. Talk about marginalized!? And the poster is just adding insult to it. It’s not enough that we have no representation....no gotta pour salt in the wounds. They can’t help themselves.

[AuntB]

“I’m an American, and I’m voting for McCain. I live in the real world, and have to make real choices, not sit at my computer and whine that there’s no “perfect” candidate.”

Oh, B.S. There were 9 candidates. I would have voted for any of them before McCain. FR polls over the last year plus prove most would have as well. He was the absolute worst there was offered up by the GOP. I didn’t even vote for the guy I wanted to try to keep McCain out. I’m sick of being your version of ‘pragmatic’. You have every right to sell out. Try not to be so smug about it. Some of us don’t see it as a virtue.

[roamer_1]

At least McCain is on our side.

What could possibly give you that idea? Can't you see past the (R) after his name?

[ozzymandus]

If you’re the one helping hillary or obama become President, you’re the one “selling out”. I’m sick of you clowns who think helping the enemy is a virtue. Try not to be so smug about selling your country out because McCain didn’t kiss your bitching ass. You’re the one spewing BS, and I’m tired of being nice to idiots betraying America because their little feelings are hurt. Grow up.

[ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas]

>>Try not to be so smug about selling your country out<<

Uh, who is selling this country out, and what country does McCain represent?

>>I’m sick of you clowns who think helping the enemy is a virtue. Try not to be so smug about selling your country out because McCain didn’t kiss your bitching ass. You’re the one spewing BS, and I’m tired of being nice<<

"being nice????" That's what you have been doing up to now, riggghhhht...

>>to idiots betraying America because their little feelings are hurt. Grow up.<<

Standard McCain troll script. That will win friends for Juanito, you betcha.

[ozzymandus]

You play with your ding dong too much.

[ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas]

You are the guy who just told AuntB to “grow up,” right? That’s what is so amazing about you McCain trolls. You keep saying “grow up” and then post pathetic attempts at insults like a 10 year old. No, I take that back, a 10 year old would be able to write a much more interesting post.

Jim Robinson is more anti-McCain than I am. Do you post idiotic insults to him?

[Politicalmom]

Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?

You have no right to speak that way to a CONSERVATIVE lady, adhering to CONSERVATIVE principles, on a CONSERVATIVE website.

My children have a better vocabulary than you do.

[ozzymandus]

No, I post idiotic insults to idiots like you who want a RAT president. Discussion is useless with fools like you; all you understand is an insult down on your level.